The proposed study will analyze the relationship between community characteristics and child health and survival in Brazil. The project will examine the role that changes in community characteristics, such as public health measures, have played in shaping the improvement and the pattern of differentials in child health and survival over the past 22 years. The specific aims of the project are: 1. To investigate the effects of community characteristics on child health and survival in Brazil, and to interpret these effects by examining how they interact with household and parental attributes; 2. To examine how changes in community characteristics have contributed to the dramatic improvement in child health and survival over the past 22 years and to determine whether the effects of these variables and the mechanisms through which they operate have changed over time as characteristics of families and communities have evolved; 3. To study how community characteristics have affected differentials in child health and survival according to important household social and economic factors, as well as region and rural-urban place of residence. Data from several different sources will be assembled to undertake the proposed research. The major sources include: Demographic and Health Surveys conducted in 1986, 1991 and 1996; large Brazilian household surveys conducted in 1974/75, 1984 and 1988; and detailed municipality data collected by the Brazilian federal statistical agency, Fundacao Instituto Brasileiro de Geeografia e Estatostoca (IBGE).